Updated Wedding Webpage

I finally updated our wedding webpages, added some new pictures. Yay!

Here are the links:

http://www.theknot.com/ourwedding/MariaChristinaLozada&JaimeAlvaradoJr

http://mariajaime.weddingannouncer.com/

Friday night dinner with good friends

Jaime and I invited our good friends Nicole and her boyfriend Fernando, Kat and John to come over Friday night for dinner. We haven't seen them since last year (Nikky & Fernando), we've all been soo busy it was soo nice to see them again.



Here are some pictures I attempted to take of the food we prepared:

I made some fresh salad greens with red bell peppers, grape tomatoes, shredded carrots, cranberries, Persian cucumbers, crutons, bleu cheese and balsamic vinaigrette...sooo yummy!


The other side dish I made is my twice baked potato...I was soo hungry that I didnt take a pic of what it would look w/the garnishes on it ie sour cream, bacon bits, chives...haha



Jaime the bbq chef that he is made some steaks and grilled them in the bbq...it was soo nice and tender the steaks literally melts in your mouth! (good job babe!) Btw the steaks are pretty huge, I would say a good 7-8 oz size. Its Friday, ok to eat unhealthy and I made the salad to pretty much balance it off...hehe jk...



Kat & John brought some beer and wine, forgot to take pictures and Nicole & Fernando brought more beer and dessert. A lovely and yummy strawberry pie from Marie Calendars.

Here are some pics we took after dinner, we were soo full...

Hopefully we get to have another get together soon...Jaime and I love making dinner and having people come over...

Our first wedding present in the mail...

I came home after a long weekend at Jaimes last Wednesday and guess what I found on top of our dining table ...

Our first wedding gift! We got a free 5" Santoku knife for registering for $500 Calphalon products. I dont even remember if we registered Calphalon stuff at Bed Bath & Beyond or Macys, one of them hehe. If we complete our registry we are eligible to receive more gifts like the Calpahlon Stir fry gift complete with a nonstick stir fry pan and nylon stir fry turner. Sounds awesome huh?

I came back home today and Mom told me we got another present! I dont know what it is but its from Macys...I wanted to open it but mom told me to wait for Jaime hehe...I guess I can wait...I'll just stare at the box and figure out what it is...its pretty light!

Tasting

I took this past Monday off so we can go to our dinner tasting for our reception. Jaime and I finally met with the Food & Beverage Director at the hotel where we will be having our reception dinner. Annice was nice and she directed us to the restaurant where we will be doing the tasting. Jaime and I got too excited that we forgot to take pictures of the food we tried that day hehe.

For our first course we had to pick between the Romaine salad with tulle parmesan cheese and traditional Caesar dressing or the Spinach Salad with gorgonzola cheese, walnuts, roasted rell pepers, with honey mustard vinaigrette. Jaime wasn't a fan of the honey mustard vinaigrette so we decided to pick the classic Romaine salad with the traditional Caesar dressing and the cute tulle parmesan cheese.

Second course we tried on three different entree choices: Braised boneless short rib of beef with garlic thyme demi, Grilled salmon with ginger and carrot butter sauce and Stuffed chicken breast with arugula, sun-dried tomatoes and feta cheese. We loved the stuffed chicken breast so she's our winner.

After eating, we went to another table to check out swatches for linens, we still havent decided which one to go for, I have to double check with Kathy Jo our wedding planner which best one to pick. Our venue also includes a table number, name cards for the guests and menu cards which is awesome I dont have to do it myself. Annice told us that they will be switching to a different vendor for that so I have to come back to pick one that would be close to our invitation design.

So yea that was fun in one day, I had to run errands after while Jaime went to work at 1:30 in the afternoon.

Next wedding planning activity would be our engagement shoot in June. I cant wait, Jaime and I decided to shoot at the Santa Monica Pier. We informed our photographers and they loved the idea yay!

Ring Shopping

This past Sunday, Jaime and I went to look for our wedding bands. My sister Kat and her bf John came along as well. We went back to the same jeweler where Jaime purchased my engagement ring. We found a lot of nice settings, I saw this cute eternity band with diamonds around it (loves it!), while Jaime found this black and grey checkered band where he can wear to work it is made of tungsten and also this other white gold band. When we go back and finally purchase it I will take pictures of it. One of the sons was there but Christine nor her mom weren't there so we'll just go back when one of them comes back from vacation so we can get a great deal :o).

After looking for rings we went to the grocery store to buy stuff for our bbq dinner. We got pork ribs, bratwurst, margarita mix, charcoal, bbq baked beans, coleslaw, mac & cheese and soda. I also marintated some pork chops the night before and Jaime decided to grill them as well. The weather was perfect for a bbq so we took a couple pictures in Jaime's lil patio. We were sooo full that night and we had a lot of food left over so Kat and John took some food to go and Jaime and I ate the rest the next day :o).